Arachnid (2001) [REVIEW] | David Bowie Joke Here

Here, have more spiders, why not?

For this specific creature feature, we’re going back to very early 2000s, and also picking this randomly from recent additions to my personal DVD collection.

Sure as shit it’s not to celebrate a 20^th anniversary release of the movie, when even the director, Jack Sholder, kinda doesn’t wanna hear anything about it and would rather forget Arachnid, even when people bring it up to say it wasn’t actually that bad.

A sentiment i do echo because this isn’t as crap as you might expect, and if nothing else, it’s not exactly done by a bunch of complete nobodies, as it was produced by none other than Brian Yuzna (Re-Animator, The Guyver, Crying Freeman, Dagon, Honey I Shrunk The Kids) and the special effects were done by Steve Johnson, behind fxs for movies like Species I and II, Nightmare In Elm Street 4, An American Werewolf In London, Big Trouble In Little China, pretty good resumè.

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Camel Spiders (2011) [REVIEW] | Not camels, nor spiders

Spiders: when you can’t afford sharks or giant reptiles for your creature feature.

And because many people do find arachnids in general to be quite disgusting, so it’s no wonder they’re a constant for b-movies since forever, especially if they’re of giant size.

This time we have Camel Spiders, one of the many late 2000s/early 2010s Roger Corman productions (sporting the “Roger Corman Presents” label on DVD releases), this one directed by Jym Wynorski… credited as Jay Andrews as usual.

For consistency’s sake, i guess.

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Arachnoquake (2012) [REVIEW] | Phantom Uses Rollout

In a sense, i’m way overdue for reviewing this, not that i was getting emails about it, but because i realize i should have seen and reviewed this before Lavalantula and the sequel, 2 Lava 2 Lantula, especially the first one, who in hindsight sound a lot like a parody of that one, but featuring the bus driver as lead instead of the washed up celebrity played by Steve Guttenberg (and yes, that movie realized the irony in that casting), just taking place in New Orleans instead of California and this time the spiders are coming out due to an earthquake caused by fracking, instead of being long lost cousins of Phantom incased in magma for millions of years that woke up and started the eruption.

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Alligator II – The Mutation (1991) [REVIEW] | Back To The Sewers

Another chapter in the accidental saga of Jaws rip-offs and their often interesting tales of genre producers basically kicking a young James Cameron out of the director’s chair, of people making movies about barracudas that actually just used them to trojan horse a completely different thriller plot, of alligators becoming giant in Chicago’s sewer system due to pharmaceutical experiments on dogs, and producers pestering poor Joe Dante into directing rip-offs of his own movies…

Once again we wander in the territory of “we wanna make another one and trick people into thinking it’s a sequel by slapping a number 2 and a subtitle on the title”, but i struggle to even justify this one’s existence. Sure, the first one ended with another baby gator being flushed down the same sewer, but usually you’d want to cash-in into a movie like this right away…. not 11 years later.

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Alligator (1980) [REVIEW] | Don’t flush the reaper

Ah yes, Wally Gator’s origin story. Or maybe not.

This one actually has sort of faded into obscurity, but it shouldn’t because it’s arguably one of the better “killer animals” film of the 70/80s, and also is a “Jaws rip-off” of sorts, in the same way as the original Piranha, to be precise, since the script is also written by John Sayles, and it’s a good combination of straight killer animal flick and light-hearted, affectionate satire of the B-movie clichès. It definitely has a sense of humour, not just by downright having P.O.V. shots of the gator with the soundtrack playing almost the Jaws theme, by having people selling merchandise of the “monster”, but also by basing an entire movie about that urban legend. 🙂

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Boa VS Python (2004) [REVIEW] | Serpentine Showdown

Unified Film Organization had some success with reptile themed TV monster movies, heck, even to warrant making a “B-movie sequel” to 2000’s Python. But it just happens in 2003 the long-gestating Freddy VS Jason crossover movie was released, and so of course unrelated companies that didn’t even operate in the same market space felt entitled to sponge off the renewed interest in horror crossovers. While – for mere coincidence – Robert Englund was actually in Python, of course calling him back for pennies after he just play Freddy Krueger again was stupid to even attempt.

What do? Since you can’t trademark actual existing animals, they figured whatever, a boa was in New Alcatraz, Python did have a genetically mutated version of the titular animal, so let’s make these two CG animals battle to the death, call it Boa VS Python, job’s a good ‘un, print, beautiful.

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[EXPRESSO] Ape VS Monster (2021) | Cranky Kong VS Zilla

Maybe it’s the pandemic and all, but i kinda missed having the Asylum pop-up to do their mockbuster version of whatever Hollywood blockbuster came out.

There’s something oddly comforting, almost reassuring in that.

And given how much Godzilla VS Kong was delayed even before the pandemic, you’d think they would have used this unexpected advantage to make the mockbuster come out earlier, but nope, so only now it’s time for the off-brand, million times cheaper Asylum offering, with Ape VS Monster.

In mockbuster tradition, the plot actually doesn’t have much to do with the movie/s “mockbustered”, and this time it’s about an ape that comes back to earth from a space pod launched decades before, crashing and releasing an alien substance, accidentally making the ape itself and a passing Gila monster grow into giant size. Eventually they fight, after the faffing about of the human characters, mostly good for old Cold War cliches, and so Eric Roberts doesn’t have to leave his war desk too much, while the main protagonist tries to save the simian, Abraham, whom she shares a special bond with.

Of course they copied that here too.

Considering everything, like not having the backing of the Monsterverse narratives, the budget, and… The Asylum being The Asylum….i will admit they really tried with this one, even if the monsters – mostly – looks about as “good” as you would expect, the production values are slightly better than i expected (cinematography is also a tad better), and there’s a bit more to the plot and to the characters (mostly), direction is fine, making for an entertaining 90 minutes low budget flick.

I have more to say (and we’ll talk about this one in more detail eventually), but for what it is, it’s actually alright, honestly surprised it ain’t worse.

Boa AKA New Alcatraz (2001) [REVIEW] | Snakes On Ice

Fear that people might mock your movie about a killer giant boa constrictor if you just call it “Boa”, without any stupid subtitle (possible even more worth of mocking)?

Do you fear the wrath of Serial Experiments Lain fans or the One Piece loyalists?

Just call it “New Alcatraz”, you can always change your mind and re-title it.. well, “Boa”, for some DVD releases. Not that’s is hard to find out this is connected to the 2000’s TV movie Python, as it’s directed by one of the writes also behind Python, and it’s produced and/or distributed by the same company, Unified Film Organization (UFO). Completely different cast, but this par for the course.

The plot sees a mining operation inside a secret “superjail” in Antarctica unadvertedly freeing a giant prehistoric snake from a million years slumber, resulting in it eating much of the prison security staff, and even the back up soldiers who brough along two paleontologists don’t have better luck. So it’s up the warden, the scientists and the surprisingly few prisoners to team up in the hope of escaping the prison and snake.

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Python (2000) [REVIEW] | ….and all i got was this lousy t-shirt

There was a time before we got for granted monster movies about giant hybrid animals, but still after the 70s and 80s brought along any kind of killer animal, even slugs.

It was the new millenium, the 90s just ended and what that meant for b-movies is that now it’s fairly cheaper thanks to computer graphics, not that it’s necessarily that easier, but for the cheapo companies that banked on pumping out crappy monster movies for the TV or home video markets, it meant not having to bother anymore with animatronics or puppets or that much more in the way of practical effects for the monster or animal you wanna make the movie about.

Not that you couldn’t use both practical AND digital effects for the creature, but it was never much of a concern anyway for movies like these and the companies that made them, which – let’s be honest about this – gladly welcomed the new, cheaper tools now available, as they meant larger profits to be made.

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Kaw (2007) [REVIEW] | Mennonite Paradise

YES, another one i was cojoled into watching and reviewing quickly because Amazon Prime Video reminded me they we’re gonna take it off their service in 5 hours. And since i’m still semi-quarantined at home, might as well watch it and review it.

This time it’s about killer birds, crows instead of general “birds”, because clichès.

And like a good chunk of these movie i’ve been “coerced” into reviewing by Amazon Prime Video removing, this is another TV movie for Sci-Fi Channel/SYFY, and it’s somewhat fitting that most of these movies about killer birds were made for TV, since the apocryphal The Birds II: Land’s End in 1994, a movie so good the director Rick Rosenthal (the original Halloween II, Bad Boys, American Dreamer, Halloween Resurrection) asked to be credited as Alan Smithee instead, was also a TV movie.

The title also echoes the “famous” snake creature feature “Sss”, you lure people into watching your movie better with this simplistic attitudine, so KAW is it. I love that in the italian release they added a subtitle with the intent to specify the ravens are not just your common, bargain basement ravens…. but if i were to translate it to english it would literally read “Attack Of The Common Ravens”.

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